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By DEBORAH NICOL
Children often participate
in roll playing games involving good and bad guys:
comic book heroes and villains, cowboys and
Indians, cops and robbers. But rarely is the
latter example played out with such realism than
on the tough city streets of Baltimore, where kids
imitate what they see every day. Rather than
learning from an episode of "Cops," they are
assuming what many take for granted to be their
inevitable lot in life -- as criminals. Many, with
the exception of the Baraka school for boys.
Directors Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady follow
twenty selected junior high boys from their
recruitment into the school to their entrance into
ninth grade. The program allows the small group to
attend a specialized school in Kenya for the
crucial two years leading up to high school, with
the goal of turning around their attitudes about
education and their future. These boys have
discipline problems, are often from broken homes,
and fall into the unfortunate group that averages
only a 24% chance of graduating from high school.
Without the distraction of chaos and violence,
they may learn to see life more clearly.
The film focuses particularly on three boys.
Charismatic Richard doesn't want to end up like
his father in prison, and wishes for a better life
for his younger brother as well. Devon is a young,
enigmatic preacher-in-the-making, supported by his
church and a strong grandmother who was forced to
raise him as his mother fell in and out of drugs.
Montrey is a kidder who always has to get in the
last word, especially when that word is in the
heat of the moment. All of these boys have
families that wish the best for them, but know
that there is a slippery slope that leads towards
dangerous territory. They recognize that education
is the golden ticket for escape, and feel this
program can help where the local school system has
failed.
What is remarkable about the Baraka program is
that the focus is on children that other programs
would abandon as a lost cause. In a nation of
school vouchers and private schools, it is
impressive to see an organization work towards
helping those students that need it most, rather
than rewarding students that are already
excelling. One of the boys is assessed to be
reading at a second grade level, and yet
apparently he has been passed up through the
system with his age group. When their Baltimore
public schools are shown in the film, chaos is
rampant. Granted these are short clips of school
life, but energy seems to be focused on
discipline, and even that effort has failed. If
only these students had been taught from the start
they are valuable and worthy, and that they can
succeed if they set high goals.
When the boys are interviewed before they travel
to Africa, they are filled with hope for their
futures. Their speeches about leaving the harsh
neighborhoods of drug dealers and criminals are
passionate, and they seem sincere. A bit may be
reiterations of what they have been told to be
their new expectations and why they should
appreciate this opportunity, but what is the harm
in that? What is troubling is that despite their
verbal confessions, their actions are mimicry of
failed lives before them. The younger lives of
parents now in prison or strung out on drugs,
lives of those who failed their education and
whose education failed them.
Halfway through their time in Africa, the school
must close for safety concerns. Both parents and
children are devastated -- even kids whose initial
reaction to the school involved much frustration.
They have built up in their minds that this
experience is their last chance for a straight and
honest life, and to return to public junior high
would erase the previous year's work. It now falls
on their own shoulders to choose whether to
challenge themselves and maintain their new
perspective, or take the easy road and settle into
the norm.
This honest film portrays no magical transitions
for these boys. That is not to say that there are
not some remarkable transformations, but this is a
real life documentary. Preteen life is difficult
enough without adding the threats of drugs and
violence that force kids to grow up faster than
they should. If it takes a village to raise a
child, what can be expected of a child with few or
no roll models and an education system that merely
tosses them on a conveyor belt to the next grade?
This film should be a challenge to the system.
Children deserve respect and confidence so that
they have a chance to become respectful and
confident adults. Is this such an expensive
concept that only private school students are
granted access to it? I think not.
Extras on the DVD include a commentary track with
both directors, and it quickly becomes evident how
much they care for their film subjects. A text
update of the boys, interesting deleted scenes and
trailers are also included. A conversation with
Bill Cosby, who grew up in Philadelphia, allows
him to discuss the importance of involvement with
children and taking the time to talk with them. |
